NEWS

A Joint Statement by the Rainforest Foundation US and Cultural Survival. Maya leaders of Southern Belize were arrested on Wednesday in a gross violation of their rights. On the early morning of June 24th, traditional leaders of the Maya people of Southern Belize were violently awoken in their homes by police on the charges of unlawful imprisonment. The charges were brought against 12 people, including the Village Chairman, and the Second Alcalde, elected by their communities according to traditional practices.

For years the Amarakaeri communal Reserve in northern Peru has been targeted for oil and natural gas extraction. Despite being a protected area, the ancestral lands of the Harakabut people, and one of the most bio-diverse zones in the world, the Peruvian government had approved A giant oil concession within the ecosystem’s headwaters and Hunt Oil began exploratory drilling in 2014.

A technologically innovative system, unveiled today by the Rainforest Foundation UK, gives forest peoples the opportunity to send near-instantaneous, highly geographically accurate reports of illegal felling of trees, such as by timber or palm oil companies, from anywhere in the world, even where there is no mobile, phone or internet connectivity. [1]

The Caribbean Court of Appeal today affirmed a lower court decision finding that, the Maya, one of the Rainforest Foundation's partners in southern Belize, have rights to the lands they have customarily used and occupied. Today’s judgment requires the government to demarcate and register Maya communal lands, and protect them against incursions by outsiders.